Lice

Got lice?  Did you start itching as soon as you read that word?  I know I did.  (Excuse me, while I scratch.)

Ever since we started school it seems like once a month we get an email home saying that a student has lice and everyone needs to take extra precautions to prevent it from spreading.  Ugh.  We've been lucky enough to dodge the lice bullet, but it seems like with each outbreak it gets closer to us and I know our days are numbered.  (Scratch.  Scratch.)

Adolpha is still in preschool where they play with dress up clothes and stuffed animals - AKA "Lice City."  Last year the school had to bag up all the dress up clothes and animals because their outbreak was quickly becoming an epidemic.  Adolpha was so sad, but all the moms breathed a collective sigh of relief.  No one wanted to be a nitpicker.   Adolpha knows now that if I put her hair in braids we've received the dreaded notice of a lice case.  "Oh, it's a lice day, Mommy?" she'll ask. 

Recently, we got the email that someone in Gomer's class had lice.  Great.  I can't braid his hair.

The email instructed us to remind our child not share combs or hats with anyone in his class.  (What first grader brings a comb to school and offers it to his friend??  And yet I still made a mental note to warn him.  This is how crazy I can get.  Scratch.  Scratch.  I come by it naturally though.  Yesterday my mother arrived at my house with rubber gloves and asked me to check her hair, because she felt "unusually itchy."  She sat in my driveway - she can't come in my house until I know she's lice-free - while I pawed through her hair and waved to my neighbors on their way to work.  Yeah, we're classy like that over here.)

"Gomer, don't share any hats or combs with anyone at school, OK?"

Gomer replied, "Is it because Maribelle has lice?"

"You know who has lice?" I asked.  The emails never name names.

"Sure.  Everyone knows it's Maribelle."

"How does everyone know?"  I asked thinking there must be some breach of confidentiality somewhere in the staff at the school.  Heads were gonna roll!

"She told us," he said.

"Oh.  Well, I guess that's OK."  So much for breach of confidentiality.

"Yeah and now Iris has it too."

"What?  Two girls in your class?  Just out of curiosity...where do Maribelle and Iris sit?"  I asked.

"On either side of me."

Ack!!!!

I got online and did some quick research and found out that lice are attracted to the cleanest heads of hair.  Oh thank goodness!  Gomer has some of the dirtiest and sweatiest hair I've ever seen on a child.  I think we're going to be just fine.  (Scratch.  Scratch.)

Thanks to everyone who voted for me in the Circle of Moms Top 25 Funny Mom Contest. I really appreciate everyone who took the time to vote for me and all the other funny bloggers on the list.  

Photo: David Castillo Dominici